Walmart Now Offers Free 2-Day Shipping to Rival Amazon Prime

Good news for those sellers who are looking to diversify their business outside of Amazon. Another Ecommerce player is making its way onto the field

Walmart just made a big move in its bid to catch up to Amazon in the ecommerce space by finally shutting down its competition service to Amazon Prime (the $50/year Shipping Pass program).

Instead the retail giant is introducing free two-day shipping to ALL customers on purchases over $35.

The two-day shipping option won’t be available for every product, but according to the CEO of Walmart U.S. eCommerce, “There won’t be too many products that you’ll want that won’t be available for two-day shipping.” More details can be found here:

It’ll be interesting to see if this move creates waves for Amazon Prime, and gives Walmart the successful splash it hopes for. Keep an ear to the ground to see if this will eventually attract more third-party sellers to sell on Walmart’s platform.

Amazon Considers Accepting PayPal

There have been plenty of rumors going on this week about whether Amazon may decide to begin offering PayPal as a payment option. PayPal currently has over 197 million active users and could help Amazon grow its customer base even bigger, particularly in international markets.

An increase in the number of buyers the additional payment gateway provides would certainly be a welcome development for sellers, and the deal might encourage more sellers to expand into some of Amazon’s less developed marketplaces.

Amazon Building Its First Air Cargo Hub

Soon after news spread of Amazon moving into the ocean freight business (covered in last week’s newsletter), Amazon announced a plan to build an air cargo hub at Northern Kentucky Airport as part of their effort to become less reliant on other companies and services to ship their products.

As Amazon continues to improve efficiencies by bringing more services in-house, hopefully they’ll pass these savings onto its sellers.

Cross your fingers, and maybe we’ll see some reduced FBA-fees in the future.

The Latest Trends In Ecommerce

eCommerceFuel just put out its first “State of the Merchant” report that analyzes the results from a survey conducted on 312 online merchants across the globe.

Although it’s a small sample size and there’s certainly bound to be some selection bias, the report reveals several interesting trends, including a surprisingly low reliance on Amazon among respondents.

Worth a look — especially if you’re interested in diversifying outside of Amazon!